Sunday, 29 March 2015

Friday was a wonderful day. In the morning the children brought in their lent boxes and they placed their coins down on the letters representing the CAFOD organisation which we were raising money for.

All week we have been discussing the importance of Lent and the children have been reflecting on their lenten promises they made at the start of Lent. It sounds like they've been working very hard to keep their promises, both at school and at home!

Friday was also the day of our mini music concert, where Year 4 performed pieces on the fife to Year 3 and Year 3 performed songs back for them. It was a lovely opportunity to share our Music learning from this term!

In the afternoon, Year 4 had organised a number of different stalls for the CAFOD fair. They counted the money they had raised at the end of the afternoon and were really pleased with their efforts! Well done Year 4!

Sunday, 22 March 2015

The children have had a fantastic Science and Engineering week this week. On Monday Year 4 had a session with Mrs Zilliox, who works for GSK in Stevenage. She explained to the children that she works developing medication to help people feel better and is a Chemical Scientist. She showed the children what they would need in order to be safe in a laboratory; safety goggles and clothing, as well as possible specialist protective equipment.

She showed the children how different materials can be separated from a 'beach' sample and also how chromatography works. The children used water soluble pens on chromatography paper. They were amazed to see the results; how different colours were separated from the soluble pen colour!

Lego workshop

On Tuesday during the lego workshop, Year 4 worked in pairs or on their own to create lego structures to go in a village. 100,000 pieces of lego were available to use and the children used their imaginations to produce some very creative designs! They used their electricity knowledge (from recent Science lessons) to create an electrical circuit, using crocodile clips, a battery and a light bulb. Some went on to use the charge of a battery to power a train along a track.

For homework this week I was amazed by the inventive designs the children created for the school seed competition. They had to design a seed from an alien planet and explain it's function and how it would be dispersed. Then in class, they used recycled materials to create their seed. Photos to hopefully follow next week!

Hatfield House visit

On Thursday Year 4 set off for Hatfield House and had a wonderful, but cold!, day visiting Henry VIII, Katherine Parr, Tomas Tallis (the court's musician) and an armourer of the King's.Enjoy the photos!